Donors' generosity helps get 'Doraleous' web series back on

Published: Thursday, March 14, 2013 at 6:51 p.m.

Last Modified: Thursday, March 14, 2013 at 6:51 p.m.

Thanks to one local production company's generous fans, Doraleous will soon be back with his animated friends hustling the needy.

New adventures for the mail-clad knight and his companions are safely tucked away in a notebook at Wilmington's Hank & Jed Movie Pictures, but it won't be long before the animated character will appear in a new season of "Doraleous & Associates," a fantasy web series that can be seen on YouTube.

A donation that pushed the production company over its $75,000 goal was logged on its Kickstarter webpage late Wednesday, according to a Hank & Jed news release.

What was surprising to the group was not that fans turned out to support the show after a two-year hiatus, but that many supporters pledged so much. Six fans kicked in $1,000 and 18 pledged $500, according to the site.

"The show ended abruptly with no real ending, but the fans have come back to support it," said Hank & Jed writer/director Brent Triplett. "The amount of people who threw in $1,000 was surprising. And all of them were international donors. Most of the donations came from all over."

For the past couple of years, Triplett and the rest of the company – including Nate Panning, Bryan Mahoney, Tony Schnur and John Etheridge – have been pitching the series to networks. The first 36 episodes aired on EscapistMagazine.com, but the next season will likely appear on the Hank & Jed YouTube channel or Machinima Network, Triplett said.

The first new episode should available in about three months, he said.

In the series, Doraleous and his friends seek out those who need some kind of help – a village under attack by an evil king, a kidnapped woman – and for a price, they'll make things right.